U. S. Defends Detention at Airports (NYT)

[ovidsen]

August 10, 2005
U.S. Defends Detentions at Airports
By NINA BERNSTEIN

Foreign citizens who change planes at airports in the United States can legally be seized, detained without charges, deprived of access to a lawyer or the courts, and even denied basic necessities like food, lawyers for the government said in Brooklyn federal court yesterday.

The assertion came in oral arguments over a federal lawsuit by Maher Arar, a naturalized Canadian citizen who charges that United States officials plucked him from Kennedy International Airport when he was on the way home on Sept. 26, 2002, held him in solitary confinement in a Brooklyn detention center and then shipped him to his native Syria to be interrogated under torture because officials suspected that he was a member of Al Qaeda.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/10/nyregion/10civil.html?pagewanted=print

I'm waiting for stories about US citizens detained at foreign airports in countries where they had no intention of doing anything but changing planes. After all, what goes around, comes around...

[ixion]

1. they can also be 'rendered' to be tortured

thanks to BushCo. :grr:

[ovidsen]

2. Which is exactly what hapened to this guy.

Who needs silly things like evidence, lawyers or judges? Just ship 'em off to the Black Hole of Damascus... or wherever....

[Solly Mack]

3. Damn thugs...nothing but tyrants...

[mogster]

4. This happened to a former Norwegian prime minister

I don't know if this is a known fact outside Norway, but our former prime minister Gro Harlem Brundtland, a very respected social democrat who whas prime minister during much of the 80's and 90's, was detained for some 45 minutes at Dulles airport in 2004.

Not much of a detainment, you might say, but it was the tone and demeanor of the personnell doing the detainment that was so revealing - and also the fact that they seemed to recognize her as a former UN top brass (she was in charge of WHO in the late 90's)


It says something when they detain an old politician, busy on her way to a conference, by putting her in a cell cut off from telephones, and refusing her to go to the loo.

The press spokesman for the US Customs and Border Protection, Barry Morrissey, said:
It won't help if you're a former diplomat or foreign national official; if we find a person's passport or visa questionable, we often have good reasons for thinking so.

(norwegian link)
http://www.aftenposten.no/nyheter/uriks/article1057441.ece

---------------------------

Now, this woman rocks! She is the most significant factor in the development of modern Norway, normalizing equal rights and also setting a good standard for women as leaders by being a strong PM from our Labour party :toast:

Onedit: added lang to link

[ovidsen]

5. She sure looks like a terrorist. Not.

I'm glad to see Ms. Brundtland was detained only briefly. I had not known about her encounter with US Customs. My apologies.

[Mairead]

7. Detaining Gro Brundtland? That's beyond shameful.

It seems to be almost a badge of honor, these days, to be rousted by the fascisti in charge of the US.

But what I'd like to know is: are there any countries in the world that are not being run by and for the benefit of the International Criminal Old-Boys' Network?

You know, the criminals who protect one another the way Straw and Albright protected Pinochet when we 'common people' had him in jail?

I'd have thought Norway one of the countries that aren't run by the criminals. But that raises the question: when are those countries going to say 'Enough!' and stop dealing with the US criminals-in-chief?

[BooScout]

6. I have witnessed horrendous treatment first hand....

In Hartsfield Atlanta Airport. My DH who is British always has to go for a secondary interview so they can copy his Advance Parole (this allows anyone pending permanent residence to re-enter the country if they travel overseas while an application for permanent residence is pending (nice name for it isn't it?:eyes: ) Many of the INS personel there think it's their duty to treat each and every foreign traveler entering or passing through Atlanta like dogshit. I have seen them yell at people because they don't speak English, threaten to throw them in jail or deport them because they don't know the exact address of the hotel where they are staying, etc. You cannot even begin to fathom the control freaks that run the shop there and I know it's like that in many airports across the country.

Once, I walked to the counter and asked how long it would take for them to copy my husband's Advance Parole (that is all they do and it almost always takes us an hour to 2 hours to have this done). The guy didn't even look up and said when he got good and damn ready...........at which point I shoved my US passport under his nose and told him he may get away with speaking to foreign visitors like that but I would be damned if he would talk to me that way because I would report his sorry ass.

[leftofcool]

8. Good for you!

I hope you got the assholes name and reported him anyway!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Left of Cool